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These variables are only prerequisites or filters, if you will, but they do not guarantee any sort of success at the national team level.
Larger countries with a substantial amount of rinks AND players, such as Japan or Poland, are still terrible. You can't grow hockey tradition and expertise out of a gardening pot with some water and sunshine.
Well I don't know much about the situation in Japan and Poland. But what I can say that in Stavanger Oilers they've succeeded in attracting a broader audience than just the traditional "hockey geek". E.g trying new things like playing on the small rink, north american size so that the games have more speed, restaurant, cheerleaders, bar, premium boxes, shops in the new arena. Now three additional teams will have this Frisk Asker, Vålerenga and Stjernen will also build new arenas with north american size rink, restaurant, bar, premium boxes, shops inside the arena. People want come and sit inside a dark and cold barn today and watch hcoeky. All this generates a much larger cashflow for the clubs so that they can develop and invest in e.g new coaches, players, practice rinks, development programs and professionalise more.
Trying to create an autonomous hockey system up until the pro level on your own actually takes a huge toll on the efficiency with which elite level talents are being pumped ou
The most talented Latvian kids after the age of 14-17 are mostly using other hockey systems with way more competitive junior leagues as a platform for continued growth, be it Sweden, the US, Canada or Switzerland.
If they all stayed in Latvia and our focus was on improving the Latvian domestic league, they would all plateau at some point.
So having a thousand kids playing hockey is nice, but when their parents have to decide whether they want to send their kid abroad across an ocean, what matters is the love for hockey and the depth of hockey tradition in your country.
Their are other paths than going to North america as 14 year old, for some that's the right thing to do, and that's fine. But their are also examples on players going through the domestic system here first. E.g Zuccarello and Espen Knutsen. Zuccarello started his career in Norway, before he went to Sweden(SHL), then some years in KHL and AHL before he became a regular player in New York Rangers at age 25-26. So we need to offer a path for those kinda players too, that aren't on the NHL radar at the age of 14. We can develop players here too. It's not the point that all players shall stay in Norway their whole career, if they're good they'll get contracts abroad.
And something tells me it's going to be primarily Sweden and the kids playing in Eastern Norway who are going to move to a more competitive foreign league. Others are mostly going to stay at home and finish their schools.
Their are also new players coming from other parts of Norway now like Trettenes and Johannesen from Western Norway who plays in switzerland and germany and on the national team. Quite newly the two first new rinks have been built in Narvik and Tromsø in the northern part of Norway. So I'm sure we in the future will se good players from many parts of the country.
For Norway it's extremely important to use Sweden and Swedish expertise and get dozens of Swedish coaches in.
To do that we have to have clubs with solid economy that's why they are working towards that. The swedes want come here and work for free, at least not the good coaches. Some clubs have foreign coaches. Swedes, canadians, finns, americans and also russian coaches have worked here. The clubs will play a major part in development of new players. We have to work on devolpment here too, and not just rely on other countries developing our players. I see nothing wrong in wanting to improve the quality of our own systems here.
. He has just lived in Norway for many years. You've to live here at least seven years to get citizenship so it's not a fast track here as in e.g Kazakhstan.
